The English Girl - Review

The disappearance of a young girl begets a political nightmare in Daniel Silva's The English Girl. Silva describes the harrowing story of one man's quest to unravel the secrets that lie behind a Corsican kidnapping. This European thriller skirts the Mediterranean to discover a truth that no one wanted to find.

Silva builds off of a well established character in Gabriel Allon. The Israeli spy fights to save the girl in one of many cliches of the genre. Allon is Superman without kryptonite and experiences danger vicariously as he leads a team of agents in search of the lost girl from England. Pages are dedicated to the summary of past adventures and serve as a complete distraction from the story at hand.

I might recommend reading The English Girl if you were looking for some casual  entertainment. Parts of it are fun, parts of it are redundant, most of it is blah. Glimmers of Silva's writing talent shine through several scenes of great tension. His gift for action and intrigue don't go totally unnoticed but are often buried in a pile dead bodies and suitcases full of cash.